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John Lynn is the Founder of the HealthcareScene.com blog network which currently consists of 10 blogs containing over 8000 articles with John having written over 4000 of the articles himself. These EMR and Healthcare IT related articles have been viewed over 16 million times. John also manages Healthcare IT Central and Healthcare IT Today, the leading career Health IT job board and blog. John is co-founder of InfluentialNetworks.com and Physia.com. John is highly involved in social media, and in addition to his blogs can also be found on Twitter: @techguy and @ehrandhit and LinkedIn.

When I was speaking at the gMed user conference, I learned about many of the users who participated on a GI focused online forum for gMed users. Essentially it’s an independent user group for gMed EHR users. Although, with so many GI doctors in one place, you can be sure there are all sorts of focused discussions that would be of interest to gastroenterology doctors.

Of course, there are a lot of other online forums that are similar to the GI forum. For example, Amazing Charts has a really active user forum. The open source EHR, OpenEMR also has a forum. I’m sure there are a lot more. I’d love to hear about other EHR forums you know about in the comments.

Many people probably don’t know that I built up much of my EMR knowledge participating in the now defunct EMR Update. It was a fantastic way for me to learn and share my knowledge. I’m sure that those who participate in the various EMR forums above get the same benefit. Although, it’s probably even more valuable since the forums above are all on the same EHR software.

I can’t tell you how valuable it is for a clinic to be able to turn to other users when they run into trouble. One of the best ways to optimize your EHR is to interact and exchange ideas with other end users. That’s why I’ve started creating a list of EHR user conferences as well. However, for those who can’t take the time off to go to a user conference, an online discussion forum is a great alternative. I’m surprised that more EHR vendors don’t create these types of forums.

“one way to create software lock in is to create a network of users that’s hard to replicate. Although, he also suggested that data could be another way to make your software defensible. I’d describe it as data lock-in and not just data. We see this happening all over the EHR industry. Many EHR vendors absolutely lock in the EHR data in a way that makes it really challenging to switch EHR software”

Switching EMR/EHR is especially hard if your data is “in the cloud.” It sounds really good — unless you want to switch. Then, as they taught us in law school, “possession is 9/10ths of the law.”

Also, it’s cool to be in the cloud until your internet goes down, or you learn that your internet provider has a faster speed and they have slowed you down so that they can sell you a faster speed (although you may only need a new cable modem).

“I’m surprised that more EHR vendors don’t create these types of forums.”

They do not want to create a forum for people to complain about the products. Plus, what about the “gag clauses” mentioned in the recent Rand study? I do not know how prevalent these things are but they may prevent users from sharing online. Makes me wonder – is there a gag clause which governs discussing gag clauses?

I once had a director-level supervisor get PISSED at my co-worker who resorted to an online forum to get help with our software. The vendor had been no help, solutions were exhausted. It was still a no no.

James,
You’re likely right about their fear of negative feedback. Although, that says a lot about a company.

The reality is that negative feedback can be used to make your product better. Plus, if you respond to negative feedback with a great response, then you turn what could be a bad thing for your company into a really positive thing. Although, this means empowering the forum moderators to be able to change things.

The reality is that doctors are talking about your EHR and saying negative things like this already. Better to hear them and address them than to just act like they don’t exist.

I’ve been known to use public forums to get solutions to problems as well. In fact, this site has brokered a number of those solutions for doctors and vendors. Not my favorite task, but for some reason EHR vendors that notice a doctor complaining about their EHR on here are quite responsive and helpful. The power of the pen (or is it keyboard now?) I guess.

Your question about gag clauses is a good one and could come into play for some.

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